From Admiration to Disrespect and Back to Rebirth: All Shades of Plastic
Summary
The article “A World of Colour and Bright Shining Surfaces: Experiences of Plastics after the Second World War” by T. Fisher explores the transformative impact of plastics on post-war design and daily life. In the aftermath of World War II, plastics emerged as symbols of modernity, hygiene, and optimism. Their versatility and affordability led to widespread adoption in various aspects of life, from household items to fashion and architecture. Designers embraced plastics for their ability to create sleek, colorful, and easily maintainable products, aligning with the era’s futuristic aspirations. The material’s prevalence in everyday objects reflected a societal shift towards convenience and mass production. However, the article also touches upon the evolving perception of plastics, noting that the initial enthusiasm gave way to concerns about environmental impact and sustainability. Fisher’s analysis provides insight into how plastics not only reshaped material culture but also influenced broader social and aesthetic values in the mid-20th century.
Critical response
The text offers an opportunity to explore the story of plastic from a broader perspective, shedding light on its historical trajectory and the reasons behind its emergence as a dominant material. It is encouraging to see that society is beginning to reconsider its reliance on plastic, shifting toward more conscious use and favoring natural and environmentally sustainable alternatives. The growing use of recycled plastics in manufacturing also reflects a positive step toward circular economy practices. However, on a personal note, I find it difficult to see any aesthetic value in plastic. Almost every plastic design object I’ve encountered has looked cheap, lifeless, or awkward—lacking the tactile warmth and visual richness of natural materials like wood, stone, or metal. This strongly affects how I perceive plastic as a material in design.
Additionally, the text raises important points about how governmental policies on plastic use can indicate a country’s environmental awareness and level of development. For instance, Germany has banned certain single-use plastics in recent years, eliminating items such as plastic straws and disposable dishware. I hope that similar legislative changes will be implemented globally. It’s crucial that both policy and design sensibility evolve to reduce our dependence on plastic.
New solution to household challenges
The House Beautiful article Use Plastics where the going is rough highlighted the transformative role of plastics in postwar American homes. It emphasized the material’s durability and ease of maintenance, particularly in high-traffic areas like kitchens, bathrooms, and laundries. Products such as Formica countertops, melamine cabinetry, vinyl flooring, and polyethylene containers were showcased for their ability to withstand the rigors of daily life. The magazine portrayed plastics as a solution to common household challenges, promoting a vision of modern living where surfaces could be easily cleaned with a damp cloth, reducing the burden of housework. This narrative aligned with the era’s optimism, suggesting that plastics could contribute to a more elegant and carefree lifestyle. Additionally, the issue reflected broader societal trends, linking the use of plastics to advancements in design and technology, and presenting them as symbols of progress and modernity.
Figure 1
“House Beautiful October 1947 p.126”
the original caption
Plastic reflections
The article “The Future of Plastics” by Norman Kietzmann, featured in DAMNº81 (Spring 2022), discusses the Vitra Design Museum’s exhibition Plastic: Remaking Our World. This exhibition delves into the complex history and evolving role of plastics in design and society. It traces the material’s journey from its early days of innovation and promise to its current status as an environmental concern. The exhibition showcases how plastics revolutionized various industries, offering versatility and affordability. However, it also addresses the ecological challenges posed by plastic waste and pollution. Through a combination of historical artifacts, contemporary design solutions, and speculative projects, the exhibition encourages visitors to reconsider their relationship with plastics. It emphasizes the need for sustainable practices, including recycling and the development of biodegradable alternatives. By presenting both the benefits and drawbacks of plastic, the exhibition aims to inspire a more informed and responsible approach to its use in the future.
Figure 2
All shades of plastic
https://www.design-museum.de/en/exhibitions/detailpages/plastic.html
As a future architect and designer, I feel a strong responsibility to engage with materials in ways that prioritize environmental health and long-term sustainability. The history and evolution of plastics, as explored in the Vitra Design Museum’s exhibition and related readings, highlight both the remarkable versatility of this material and the urgent need to rethink how we use it. I am particularly interested in working with recycled plastics and supporting design initiatives that aim to make plastic use more environmentally responsible. Thanks to modern technologies, it is now possible to produce recycled plastic products that are not only durable and recyclable, but also visually appealing. However, these innovations often remain expensive to produce, which conflicts with the current economic demand for low-cost manufacturing. Beyond material choice, I also believe it’s essential to advocate for a reduction in consumerism—whether we’re talking about plastic or natural resources. Sustainable design must challenge excess, not just beautify it.
Plastic: An Ever-Spreading Disease
Tom Fisher’s article from 2013, “A World of Colour and Bright Shining Surfaces: Experiences of Plastics after the Second World War,” examines the evolving perceptions and applications of plastics from the conclusion of World War II through the mid-1970s. He discusses how plastics were marketed for their “wipe-clean” hygiene and vibrant, colorful surfaces, which were symbolically linked to a hopeful post-war future, distracting from the war’s impact. Advertisements diligently emphasized these qualities, showcasing plastics to brighten environments and promote a carefree lifestyle. However, by the mid-1960s, consumer attitudes began to shift as awareness of the environmental consequences associated with these materials grew increasingly apparent.
Fisher describes a new phenomenon known as the “Plastic Man, who lives in a “plastic” age. This new age of man is constantly surrounded by plastic surfaces and their colorful and shiny surfaces, going as far as to say that even their coffin will be plasticized. Gender roles have even been affected by this new age of plastic, as women have become the key role of plastic consumption. With every development in plastic came more information about the material. People quickly became skeptical and fearful of plastic’s mobility: PVC and Surfacin, which were vital to the aesthetics of plastics, were in the middle of public outcry.
Historical Case:
An advertisement for a plastic coating that can be used on virtually any surface in a home, specifically in kitchens. House Beautiful, February 1960, page 33. “When expense is no object and new ideas for “Pacesetter’ kitchens abound–nobody, but nobody, can think of a more luxurious, colorful carefree surfacing than Formica laminated plastic…”
By the 1960’s, plastic has nearly taken over all aspects of the housing market. It was used from anywhere to kitchen products, disposable tools, and even counter tops as seen from the image above. After a large scale and in increase in public information about plastic, homes and lifestyles drastically changed decade after decade.
Contemporary Case:
A person holding two reusable bags at the market. City of Philadelphia, April 2023, https://www.phila.gov/2023-04-27-this-earth-month-we-celebrate-the-impacts-of-the-citys-plastic-bag-ban-one-year-in/. “This Earth Month, we celebrate the impacts of the City’s Plastic Bag Ban one year in”
Since the beginning of the new millennium, governments from across the globe have urged their citizens to limit the consumption and use of plastics in their daily lives. Popular trends emerged out of these transitions, such as replacing plastic straws with metal ones or bringing reusable bags to go grocery shopping, as seen above.
Plastic Modernity
Summary
This week’s reading, A World of Colour and Bright Shining Surfaces: Experiences of Plastics after the Second World War by Tom Fisher, explores how plastic materials came to symbolize modernity through their visual and tactile qualities, especially their shiny, smooth, and colorful surfaces. After WWII, plastics were widely promoted as hygienic, bright, and easy-to-clean materials that promised a cheerful and convenient domestic life. Fisher highlights how these qualities shaped consumers’ sensory experiences and cultural perceptions of plastics during the postwar boom. However, over time, plastics’ glossy surfaces showed wear, scratches, and fading, which contributed to growing skepticism and environmental concerns. The article emphasizes plastics’ dual identity as both symbols of innovation and as problematic materials, demonstrating how surface qualities played a key role in the cultural meanings attached to plastics in the mid-twentieth century.
Application
A Tupperware advertisement from a 1970s issue of House Beautiful illustrates how plastic was promoted as a modern solution for domestic life. These ads often showed neatly stacked colorful containers with seamless, shiny finishes. The surfaces emphasized cleanliness, convenience, and a cheerful aesthetic. Fisher describes plastics as surfaces that promised a brighter and more efficient future, and Tupperware delivered that promise to postwar families. The containers were lightweight, easy to seal, and reusable. Their glossy appearance supported the idea of a hygienic, well-managed kitchen. However, as Fisher notes, these same surfaces became worn, stained, or warped over time, complicating their initial image of perfection and revealing plastic’s impermanence.
Second, the Eames molded plastic chair is a widely recognized example from mid-century modern design. These chairs feature smooth, shiny plastic shells that provided a lightweight, hygienic, and colorful seating solution that was affordable and mass-produced. Their tactile and visual qualities reflected the postwar enthusiasm for plastic as a new material of modernity and convenience. As with kitchen plastics, their surfaces showed wear over time, creating a tension between their innovative appeal and material limitations. The chair remains an iconic symbol of plastic’s evolving identity in design history.
Figure 1. Wooden interior stairs leading up to living room
House Beautiful, January 1961, p. 45
Figure 2. MOLDED PLASTIC ARMCHAIR DATE – 1950 | Image courtesy of Eames Office
From Gleam to Green: The Changing Meaning of Plastic Surfaces in the Home
Reading Summary / Takeaway
In “A World of Colour and Bright Shining Surfaces,” Tom Fisher argues that postwar plastics were defined as much by their sensory surface qualities—shiny, smooth, and colorful—as by their chemical makeup. Plastics were not just materials of convenience, but of cultural meaning: initially celebrated for hygienic, futuristic aesthetics, then increasingly critiqued for being artificial and toxic. Early promotion efforts by technologists like Yarsley and Couzens portrayed plastics as enabling a utopian, modern lifestyle defined by cheerful color, cleanliness, and ease. These ideals were reinforced through postwar advertisements in magazines like Ideal Home, which associated plastic surfaces with domestic progress and visual delight. However, by the late 1960s, this positive image destabilized. Focus group data and emerging ecological concerns revealed consumer distrust in plastics’ safety and authenticity, particularly in food-related applications. Fisher frames this duality—joyful modernity vs. material skepticism—as central to the cultural experience of plastic surfaces.
Current Case: IKEA SORTERA Recycling Bins
IKEA’s SORTERA recycling bins exemplify contemporary plastic design that inherits the mid-century ethos of utility, modularity, and hygiene, but reframed through a lens of environmental responsibility. Designed for waste sorting and tight storage spaces, SORTERA bins retain the tactile smoothness and cleanability praised in the 1950s but shift the narrative away from domestic luxury toward sustainable living. While mid-century plastics were marketed as glamorous and colorful, SORTERA’s design is minimalist—muted in tone but practical in function. Like Fisher’s account of bright, hygienic plastic surfaces from Ideal Home ads, SORTERA’s polypropylene body still promises wipe-clean ease and durability. However, instead of symbolizing carefree consumption, these bins represent organized eco-consciousness. They mark an evolution in the way plastic surfaces are interpreted: no longer just about shine and novelty, but about systems-thinking and responsibility in the domestic environment.
Figure 1. IKEA SORTERA bins shown in stacked configuration for waste sorting and storage
Historical Case: DuPont Vinyl Recliner Advertisement (House Beautiful, 1960)
This 1960 House Beautiful advertisement from DuPont exemplifies the mid-century marketing strategy described by Fisher, where plastic’s “bright, shining surfaces” symbolized cleanliness, comfort, and modernity. The ad positions vinyl—a synthetic plastic—as both stylish and technologically advanced, claiming a new level of “breathability” and luxury. This blends the visual sleekness of plastic with tactile innovation, presenting the material as not just wipeable and durable, but also sensually comfortable and health-conscious. The wide range of colors along the bottom border reinforces plastic’s association with consumer choice and modern domestic identity. Fisher’s point about plastic’s surfaces being sold as gateways to an improved, futuristic lifestyle is clearly evident here. As with other 1950s and early ’60s examples, this ad captures the tension between genuine innovation and the looming perception of artificiality that would challenge plastic’s status in the decades that followed.
Figure 2. DuPont vinyl upholstery chair featured for its breathability and modern finish
House Beautiful 1960, no. 1, p. 39
Comparison:
Both the IKEA SORTERA bins and the DuPont vinyl recliner reflect the way plastic surfaces communicate broader cultural values, yet they do so in radically different ways. The DuPont chair, as seen in the 1960 House Beautiful ad, uses plastic’s shiny, smooth texture to express postwar optimism, domestic luxury, and modern convenience—qualities that Fisher identifies as central to the sensory appeal of early plastics. In contrast, the SORTERA bins communicate restraint, control, and responsibility through subdued color, matte texture, and utilitarian form. Where DuPont’s plastic surface symbolized delight and abundance, IKEA’s plastics now imply order and sustainability. This shift marks a cultural transition from the plastic-as-pleasure era of the 1950s–60s to a contemporary sensibility that associates plastics with systems of reuse and ecological awareness. Still, in both cases, the meaning of plastic is built not just on function, but on how its surface looks, feels, and fits into the values of the time—exactly as Fisher argues.
A world of color and bright shining surfaces
Overall this article looks at the rise and eventual stabilization of plastic as a material in the age of Industrial Design. What did plastic signify in the west? How was it marketed and sold to consumers? What were the sensory aspects that plastic evokes? and finally, how did the material reach Stabilization in the Market, making it a go to material for many things that were once glass and or ceramic? In today’s world it is concerning to think of all of the items around us that are made of plastic, how prolific the material is- especially as it is associated with food. The article touches on the concerns around health, even back in the 1960’s-70’s but it is clear that the makers of plastic and the big oil money behind it did a great job and hiding research and burying concerns- as well as lead an amazing advertising campaign.
I appreciate that Tom Fisher looked so much into the advertising of plastic items so thoroughly. One statement that was brought up again and again was “clean surfaces” which I found to be nothing short of ironic. Of course what was being advertised is that plastics are “easy to clean” however, the surface itself we now know leaches forever chemicals otherwise PFAS. From an advertising point of view plastic had the ability to “be fluid” in its appearance, with its shine and smoothness and therefore was associated with sleekness, cleanliness and overall modernity. What I find to be one of the many devastating byproducts of plastic use and consumption is the fact that we have lost earlier systems of re-use and recycling all together. Entire economic circular endeavors. Thinking of the concept of the Milk Man for example- no longer do we as a society “have” to think about returning glass containers we simply just throw away more plastic- as even the idea that plastic can truly be recycled is a misconception. As most developments during this time the ad’s were targeted towards women who were running the home as their domain.
Out of curiosity I went to Ikeas website to look and see how many products would pop up if I put in the keyword “Plastic” there are currently 306 different Ikea items that fit that category of plastic. Including the “best selling” stool in this post. Plastic makes things cheap and easy to manufacture. The Marius black stool can be yours for just $4.99 and that really is cheap in today’s economy, I spent more on a Matcha latte just yesterday. As a piece of furniture however it is functional but not really designed. It is very simple but all concerns were made for value engineering. At the start of the Industrial Design there was still a sense that what was being made was in fact “designed” but a part of that Stabilization process that was referred to in the article was the material really finding its place in the market. This, to me is where the plastic proliferation has gotten us to, Cheap Value engineered stuff- an abundance of crap- essentially. Quantity over quality with a lot to be desired. Looking back at the post war age however we see an advertisement for Tupperware that is being celebrated just like the 4th of July- in front of sparklers and cannons- it is the epitome of freedom and the most American thing you can participate in… Historically this is unfortunately true.
Ikea Chair
Stack of tupperwear
The Modern Appeal of Plastic, AI, and Vinyl Flooring
In the article “A World of Colour and Bright Shining Surfaces: Experiences of Plastics After the Second World War,” the author discusses how the popularity of plastics was largely due to their aesthetic qualities. In the postwar world, when many things were focused on functionality and less so on visual appeal, this new material changed the game. Plastic was glossy and available in so many colors, it helped bring more of an enjoyable experience to everyday tasks. The material’s affordability and sense of modernity were key draws that made plastic so highly sought after, meaning that this “experience” could be brought to nearly every item.
The article discusses how plastic was used in everyday items like toothbrushes, combs, and kitchenware. There was a thrill in using this new and modern material, reflectant of a domestic culture’s focus on the future. Plastic products represented cleanliness, convenience, and change for the better– the ideal modern lifestyle.
A modern example of this could be seen as artificial intelligence. AI is a feature in nearly everything today. It reflects a company’s modernity to include AI in some element of their product. Whether you use the AI feature or not, tech products that don’t have AI feel outdated and may be reflectant the product is not as advanced as others in their field.
- Fig 1. Text messages using iMessage’s AI feature
- Via Apple.com Newsroom
This advertisement from House Beautiful promotes a vinyl flooring company using key modern elements and buzz words to draw in consumers. The color is the initial draw to the advertisement, a sign of modernity. The caption also goes on to express how many pattern and color options there are, pushing this modern feature. The cleanliness of vinyl flooring, another element that is connected closely to a desire for modernity.
- Fig 2. LET’S FACE SOME BEAUTIFUL FACTS! Only this luxury vinyl floor could be so work-free! Grown Vinyl is rubless, scrubless! Spill almost anything on it and it twinkles at a mop’s much Stronger, wears longer in the all-important traffic zones, too (doorways, in front of Sinks, stoves, appliances, etc.)! Over 100 beautiful patterns. See the floor with the exclusive 12 year guarantee at your franchised Crown Vinyl retailer soon. By the makers of Sandran, Sabdura Company, Benson-East, Jenkintown, Pa. LUXURIOUS CROWN VINYL FLOORS
- House Beautiful, Issue 102 pt. 2, 1960, p. 36
These two are similar in that they both are industries chasing the contemporary definition of modernity. AI and vinyl are promoted using the desire of the modern people– a push towards the future. However, unlike vinyl flooring, AI is in a league of its own. It is not competing to be the trendiest product, but companies use it as a tool to do so.